Southwestern Energy Fighting Ohio County, WV Fire Dept. Fee
Ohio County, WV, like many rural counties, has a string of volunteer fire departments that respond to calls in their respective localities. When an industrial activity like shale drilling shows up, local volunteers need special (ongoing) training to address the unique circumstances involved with a well pad fire. There’s also all of the extra calls local fire departments get from the sheer volume of vehicle traffic related to workers coming and going, and trucks hauling all manner of materials–from pipes to equipment to water. Those vehicles sometimes get into accidents, requiring a fire truck to respond. So Ohio County passed a $5,000 per well pad fee, per year, to help defray those costs. Southwestern Energy is the only driller active in the county, currently, with some 29 well pads. For Southwestern, the fee equals $145,000 per year, year after year, going to the local fire department effort. When Ohio County sent Southwestern the bill, Southwestern didn’t pay it. Instead, they filed a lawsuit claiming the fee is “arbitrary and excessive”…
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An important breakthrough in our long struggle to overthrow the odious and misnamed Obama Clean Power Plan–a plan that assassinates coal and mortally wounds natural gas (see 
Talk about a waste of taxpayer time and money. The so-called leaders of Newtown Township in Bucks County (Philadelphia orbit) took time out to compose, debate, and pass a resolution opposing the PennEast Pipeline. Even though the pipeline isn’t coming anywhere near Newtown Township. What the vote reveals is that Newtown is led by far-left anti-fossil fuelers with nothing better to do than get on their soapbox and prance around discussing issues that don’t affect the residents of the town. Typical leftist politicians that believe they know better than you what’s best for you–even if it doesn’t even affect you…
Events related (or of interest) to the Marcellus and Utica Shale, primarily pro-drilling events.
The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading. In today’s lineup: Mariner East 2 constructions begins in Cumberland County, PA; Atlantic Sunrise Pipe pays grants for pool upgrades, fire equipment; Cecil Twp holding public hearing on Range Resources well pad plan; one year after pipeline explosion in Salem Township; WV property owners meet ahead of Supreme Court case re post-production expenses; Trump signs order to allow offshore drilling; Alliance pipeline wants to expand from Western Canada to Chicago; and more!
It’s finally come to this. There is one anti-fossil fueler who sent a letter to the editor of a Colorado newspaper–the Boulder Daily Camera–that says antis “have a moral responsibility to blow up wells and eliminate fracking and workers.” In a followup interview, the same anti said, “I wouldn’t have a problem with a sniper shooting one of the workers” at a drilling site. Have we not warned you that anti-fossil fuel lunacy has finally tipped over into violence? Did we not point out the mob in North Dakota that destroyed millions of dollars in equipment, burned tires, and shot at police–is planning to spread their sedition to places like the Marcellus/Utica (see 
Truly maddening. A Pennsylvania farming family has had to put up with Chesapeake Energy’s lame justifications for not paying them a dime in royalties over the past two years, even though Chesapeake continues to extract gas from their property. Chesapeake claims that since 2015, their costs to extract/sell gas from Russ Forba’s land exceeded any revenue generated–by $112,000. Chesapeake promised Forba that the company would not try to recoup those “costs” from future royalties. The company just broke its promise. On Monday, Forba received a statement from Chesapeake revising the price of the gas sold (down), and revising the post-production costs claimed (up) for the month of April 2015. Chesapeake then deducted the extra $5,700 “loss” from current royalty payments to cover the difference–something they PROMISED would never happen. This is why PA landowners are incensed and calling for legislation. We don’t blame them…
In January, MDN highlighted a developing issue in Ohio that potentially impacts Utica/Marcellus shale in the region (see 
As of today, the nameplate on the door that says “Sunoco Logistics Partners” is getting changed to “Energy Transfer Partners” (ETP). On paper (and for investors) Sunoco LP & ETP have been different companies, but functionally both companies have co-existed under the Energy Transfer Equity (ETE) umbrella for years–essentially as different divisions of the same company. Sunoco LP is (currently) best known for its Mariner East pipeline projects–along with the Marcus Hook refinery/terminal. ETP is (currently) best known for the recently completed Dakota Access Pipeline. Sunoco LP’s headquarters will move from Newtown Square, PA to combine with ETP’s HQ in Dallas, TX. For investors, Sunoco LP will stop trading at close of business today and become part of the ETP ticker symbol as of Monday. Shareholders for both companies approved the paper merger on Wednesday…
Penn State University professor Terry Engelder, the geologist who first discovered the potential of the Marcellus (and called “the Father of the Marcellus Shale”) is retiring from Penn State in June. The Marcellus Shale boom, while starting with a single Range Resources well in 2004, is largely due to the insights of Engelder. In 2007 he did some “back of the envelope” calculations that showed (first) there is roughly 50 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of recoverable natural gas in the Marcellus. He later revised that number, to 489 Tcf. It was Engelder’s calculations that caught the interest and confidence of drillers who then decided to give the Marcellus a try. The rest is history–and we have Dr. Engelder to thank. Penn State News does a good job in providing a tribute to celebrate the contributions of Engelder to the university’s geosciences department. What will Engelder miss the most when he retires? Finding new shale layers? Figuring out new techniques to extract oil and gas? Maybe a better way of predicting earthquakes? Nope. He’ll miss the people–students and the professors/staff at “one of the finest geosciences departments in the world.” Here’s a proper sendoff for a key figure, a giant in the canon of the Marcellus story…
Range Resources, one of the most prolific producers in southwestern Pennsylvania, reported its first quarter of profit in two years. Range swung from a loss of $94 million in 1Q16 to a profit of $170 million in 1Q17. After two years of cutting its capital expenditure spending, Range is once again increasing capex. This year, Range plans to spend $1.15 billion, with 65% allocated to the Marcellus Shale in PA, and the rest to the Terryville Field in LA. Production soared for the company by 40% year over year, to a new record high of 1.93 billion cubic feet equivalent (Bcfe) per day. Below we have the full Range 1Q17 update, along with the latest PowerPoint slide deck. We’ve also extracted out some interesting comments from the quarterly earnings call, which highlight Range’s program of drilling longer laterals in the Marcellus…
EQT, one of the biggest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica, had quite a ride in 2016. A good ride! In the last 10 months EQT has added 220,000 acres to its Marcellus/Utica portfolio–by buying large tracts from other companies. One of the deals included buying the other company (Trans Energy) lock, stock and barrel (see 
As they have in previous quarters, Rex Energy released only part of their first quarter 2017 update earlier this week. Rex released an operation update on Monday, but elected to not release (yet) a financial update. Rex has struggled. They are a smaller driller focused mainly on the Marcellus/Utica–headquartered in State College, PA. In 2016, Rex lost $109 million (see 
More twists and turns to report with respect to an issue we previously reported with the potential to impact every mineral rights owner and driller in West Virginia. In December MDN reported on the huge West Virginia Supreme Court decision against driller EQT that disallows EQT from deducting post-production expenses from royalty checks, even with signed contracts in place (see 
The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) has temporarily rejected PennEast Pipeline’s Freshwater Wetlands Individual Permit and Water Quality Certificate application, submitted April 6. NJDEP said in their response that PennEast has not provided enough detail about the project–leaving out key pieces of information for two-thirds of the pipeline’s 37-mile trek through NJ. NJDEP says they want the application refiled within 30 days, and if PennEast doesn’t give them what they want within 60 days, the DEP will consider the application “withdrawn.” The news from NJ comes on the heels of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers also telling PennEast they need more information too. Radicalized antis are rejoicing and their mouthpieces in mainstream media are painting this as a grim development for PennEast–perhaps the death rattle has begun. PennEast, on the other hand, is treating the news as a minor bump in the road–the application has just a “few outstanding items” that PennEast needs to track down and provide to the DEP, and then all will be just fine. We suppose the next 30-60 days will tell the tale…